Guajillo Chile Vanilla Barbecue Sauce

A slow and steady burn of dried chilies, the perfumed aroma of whole vanilla beans, a savory background of tomatoes and vinegar. Achievable. Incredible. 

It's all possible when you make your own BBQ sauce. Long gone are the days that condiments are mandated to come from a squeeze bottle.

Just looking at the ingredients on the back of a store-bought BBQ sauce will cause you to reconsider the convenience of them. The first three ingredients are usually corn syrup, sugar, and tomato paste. 

Shameful.

Making your own BBQ sauce not only allows you to control the sugar content, it allows you to create a depth of flavor that store bought squeeze sugar can't compare too.

There are many different recipes and combinations for barbecue sauce. Depending on the region you are from, you may be more prone to a vinegar heavy sauce or maybe even a mustard based sauce. I'm not here to tell you which one is the most authentic, I'm just here to offer you the best recipe available - this one.

It's the perfect summer-autumn transition. Loathe to let go of summer, but embracing of the cool crunchy weather of fall, this BBQ sauce will caress you like your favorite hoodie, comforting your sunburnt mind as it readies itself for cooler nights and a serious lack of beach. Pretend it's not September while you make cedar plank salmon slathered with this sauce from the gods. 

There are a lot of ingredients in this sauce because we are creating LAYERS of flavor. As a matter of fact, it's DEPTH AND AWESOMENESS that you're tasting here. It's a savory vanilla sauce that will make people love you. It's practically begging to be added to a Bloody Mary.

Here you are. Set yourself free.

Guajillo Vanilla Barbecue Sauce

makes approx 2 - 3 cups

3 Guajillo Chiles

1 Vanilla Bean

1/2 cup apple cider vinegar

1/4 cup brown sugar

1 tbls. tomato paste

1/2 cup crushed tomatoes

1 tsp. cumin

1 tsp black pepper

1 tsp yellow mustard seeds

1 1/2 tsp smoked paprika

3 cloves garlic chopped

1/2 cup chopped onion

1 cup boiling water

1 tbls. butter

Salt to taste

1. Set the water to boil and take the stems out of your chilies. Steep the chilies in a bowl in the boiling water, covered, for 15 minutes.

2. In a large saucepan, melt the butter, and add the garlic and onions. Cook until soft and translucent - about 5 - 7 minutes.

3. If your spices aren't already ground, go ahead and do that while the onions cook. Add them to the onion mixture and let cook about 1 minute. Smells awesome so far right?

4. Add everything except the vanilla and the chilies to the pan. Add about 1 tsp. salt. Stir.

5. Cut the vanilla bean in half and slit it down the sides so that you can see the seeds inside. Scrape them directly into the sauce. Add all that jazz into the saucepan.

6. Put all the chilies and their liquid into a blender, and blend on high for 1 minute. Add this to the sauce pan.

7. Bring to a boil, then turn down to low, and let it simmer for about 45 minutes.

8. Squeeze whatever you can from the vanilla beans and then throw them out. Pour the sauce into the blender and blend on high for 2 minutes.

9. Strain through a coarse strainer - really, you're just getting rid of the larger bits of Guajillo seeds. They are edible, but unpleasant to chew. (It's BBQ sauce, not chunky ragu)

That's it. You've made the best condiment in your fridge. You're halfway to perfect pulled pork. You're one step closer to BBQ bliss. You're the star of your own show.

Food52 and Beyond

Because I haven't been posting on ETI, but I have been creating content through Food52, I just want to share all the things I've written for them so far.

You can look for me by username: William Widmaier and click follow!
You'll need to sign up to follow, but it's free and then you'll become a member of Food52!

Here are a lot of the articles I've authored so far:

These are the three most recent, and they were also shared through Yahoo Shine.

Dinner Tonight: Grill-Roasted Meatloaf + Horseradish Dill Potato Salad
Dinner Tonight: Patty Melts + Grilled Swiss Chard Stems
Dinner Tonight: Herb-Crusted Pork Chops + Potato Salad with Arugula

This next one I really liked, and I really wanted people to make it because it just sounds so good. It's a great way to use a lot of greens!

Dinner Tonight: Ginger Fried Rice + Wok-Fired Squid & Greens

Photo by James Ransom

This is the photo that made me really want to eat this. James is a great photographer, and it's been a pleasure working with him during my internship. I've had a chance to add my input for shots, watch the process of shooting and editing, as well as pick his brain about food photography.

Anyway, back to the links!

Dinner Tonight: Bacon-Wrapped Hot Dogs + Roasted Fries

Quick Pickling 101

How to Clean Squid


There are more, but these are some of the best.

I'm going to continue to pitch stories and articles to Food52, so keep a lookout for more!

Either way, I'm happy to update, as I haven't posted anything in quite a while.

Let me know what you guys think in the comments!

Social Media

Hello Internet world,

I have been very busy recently. Not only do I work two jobs, I recently became the new Editorial Intern for Food52. (Yay me!)

What this means. I work seven days a week, and I have had almost no time for proper food adventures.

Yes I am still eating food.

No I haven't been taking any pictures of it.

I'm sorry that this blog, and all of you, have to suffer.

Really.

Anyway, the good news is, that you can follow Eat The Internet (aka ETI) on Facebook. This is a place that I will still post things, whether they are just cool things I've found, or food that I'm eating.

Eat The Internet of Facebook!

Also, keep a lookout for William Widmaier on Food 52.

I have been in charge of Recipe of the Day, as well as pitching story ideas and recipe roundups (menu ideas). What are those you ask? Check out the site and see for yourself!

My most recent article is about Ovens. Exciting, I know! 

Thank you all, and when I have some time, I will begin posting actual pictures and posts.

Sincerely,
William

Choc-a-lot

Valentines day brings chocolate to stores everywhere (thank god that's over). Subjected to terrible heart shaped chocolates (the kind that hurt your teeth) and a forewarning of terrible Easter bunnies to come, it is an overindulgence of sweets that most of us don't really need.

But chocolate is so good, we cannot simply ignore it!

In fact, chocolate should be, and is, celebrated. (In NYC Feb. 4th through the 13th is Chocolate Week, sorry you missed it)

Now I don't mean Milky Ways and Hershey Kisses, but rather the more savory side of chocolate.

Savory chocolate like a Mexican style mole of slow simmered chocolate and cinnamon and about a million other ingredients.
Savory dishes like the chili recipe with a healthy dose of bittersweet swirled in for richness and depth. The double chocolate porter or oatmeal stout you use for your signature beef stew recipe that creates a silky background and a malty sweetness.

I'm talking chocolate with chilies and salt. I'm talking chocolate! (This is also an excuse to use up all the chocolate laying around the house you're trying to avoid.)

The bitterness of unsweetened chocolate pairs very well with deep-flavored, complex dishes. Stew, chili, and braises, all gain a familiar, but hard to place, unctuous quality when chocolate is added.

Once you start using chocolate in recipes, you'll start using it more and more.

Mole style chocolate is up first. In order to learn all you need about Mole, I suggest the wiki on it.

I suggest using Mexican style chocolate for all your mole dishes. Taza, a brand from Mass., has quite a few different flavors that would be conducive to cooking, including a salt and pepper flavor, as well as almond, serrano, orange, the list goes on. They have so many flavors. 

Most Mole adaptations are based on the poblano style. A rich sauce of chilies and chocolate, finished with a sprinkling of toasted sesame seeds. The number of ingredients and amount of each, varies depending on who is making it, but the basic principle is vegetables (tomato, onion), dried chilies, chocolate, spices and nuts. Everything together is very flavorful. You don't need a lot of each ingredient to make a lot of sauce.

Some Mole recipes here, and here are a great start to making actual mole and enjoying a flavorful sauce that's great anytime of the year. This next recipe is especially nice on a cold day (oven) or in the summer heat (smoker/outside).  I wish I had taken these pictures...

Intense Mole Ribs - You can make these in your oven instead of a smoker, so it's a good excuse to get your house warm with the wonderful aroma of meat! It is a relatively easy recipe but requires a little bit of work. It's totally worth it.

So we get the point that chocolate is awesome, right? Okay, here is a list of recipes worth trying.

Lamb rub with chocolate and cloves - I love the way this recipe combines cloves with chocolate. I find cloves to be a very in-your-face flavor that is generally forgotten except in baked ham or mulled cider.

Chocolate Stout Chili - Great excuse to go buy some awesome chocolate stouts (a great beer!). This recipe has the added bonus of using both bittersweet chocolate and a chocolate stout. I like Brooklyn Black Chocolate Stout, and also Rogue Chocolate Stout (22oz. bottle means you get some too).

Steak with Chocolate Stout pan sauce? - Why yes, yes I would like a steak.

Give these a try, and you might just start using more chocolate around the house.

What are some of your favorite recipes for chocolate?

Poetry Corner

This poem, titled Mmmmm, was written for the satisfaction of it.

Mmmmm

Meat Man Mentions Me,
Making Movements;
Material Mastication.
Morbid Motions.

Oven Lovin'

It's oven season.

Cold days and warm ovens go together like hot chocolate and marshmallows; and any excuse to use your oven is usually a good one.

Stews and baked goods are at a peak right now, and with a big snowfall coming to the east coast, it's going to get pretty cozy. (It's probably pretty cozy right now!) Refueling is a must after a solid romp in the snow and you could use some projects to stay busy. Especially projects that produce awesome food.

The aromas wafting towards your nose are reason enough to utilize the powerful workhorse that is an oven. Some of the best smells come from a full oven: cookies baking, chicken roasting, banana bread - the list goes on.

Anyway, lots of snacking is in order. You're already using your oven for a hearty chicken tagine or ratatouille, you may as well keep going while it's hot!

Yes, this post is about snacking; and ovens. Great, right?

Cans of chickpeas hiding in your pantry behind half a bag of pancake mix have more potential than just hummus. I suggest this zippy appetizer.

Zesty Spiced Oven-Roasted Chickpeas
2 cans chickpeas (about 15 ounces each, but feel free to make from scratch)
2 tablespoons of olive oil
1 tablespoon coarse sea salt
1 teaspoon ground coriander
2 teaspoons cayenne pepper (less if you're heat sensitive, wimp)
1/2 teaspoon cumin
zest from one lemon (organic)

Heat the oven 400°F.
Pour the chickpeas into a colander, drain and rinse very well under running water.
Pat dry. Don't put them in the oven until they are dry - trust me.
Toss the chickpeas with the olive oil and spread out on a large cookie sheet (you may need to do two batches; perfect excuse to make two flavors)
Roast for 30-40 minutes or until brown and crispy. If you place them on the middle rack in the middle of your oven, they shouldn't burn, but you'll want to check them every 15 minutes or so. (Give them a good shake)
Take out and toss with salt, zest and spices to taste while they are still hot! (It's easy to add more spices, but it's hard to take them out)


Excellent crunchy spicy snacks to get your palate ready and your mouth watering for the main event, which should be:
Moroccan Chicken Tajine.

I suggest using a little bit of red pepper flakes with this recipe, although your tongue may still be tingling from the chickpeas!

And that, my friends, is how you get the most of your oven. Now check out the next recipe, which I imagine will become a new addiction.

Two words: Garlic Confit

Pretty much just poaching garlic in oil, and basically making garlic butter. AKA the food of the gods.
I love that this recipe calls for 65 cloves of garlic. Incredible.
This is when you shamelessly buy peeled garlic by the half-gallon.

Saveur suggests using the cloves in mashed potatoes, which I am inclined to think is a fantastic idea. Because you're going to need a side dish for the roast chicken you just made.

Don't even roast a whole chicken, just get a big pack of thighs or leg quarters and make some garlic mashed potatoes with it. Spread the garlic on toast. Mash the garlic with a fork and then just straight eat it. You know you want to.

And while we're at it, you should make some kale chips. Yeah I said kale chips.

Look, I'm not going to post a recipe for kale chips. They are ridiculously easy to make, and any basic search is going to give you 100+ recipes. But seriously, they're super easy, you don't even have to cut the stems out. You can just rip them up with your hands. And to be honest, they don't last long enough to ponder anything about them except why you didn't buy more kale.

So without a recipe, I can only give you a suggestion. Instead of olive oil, use spicy sesame oil (thanks Sheri!) or try Old Bay or curry powder, which are probably all of the easiest flavors to use except sea salt.

All in all, just don't forget to give your oven some lovin'.

Roots and Tubers and Squash, Oh My!

Root vegetables. Ahh, yes.
Let's include squash too, because as much as it's not a root vegetable, it is almost 100 percent root vegetable.

As delicious as stews full of starchy love are, and as much as you like roasted sweet potato and carrot soup, it's time to re-imagine these lovely tubers and roots.

It's time to branch out to new tubers and unfamiliar things that you don't even know taste good!

First up, sunchokes. Yeah these knobbly little roots are excellent. They may not be on your radar, but chefs are snatching them up and using them for all sorts of things. Smoking them over hay, making them into sauerkraut, crisping them in cubes to make 'croutons.'

Sunchokes are decidedly better mid-January after cold weather has officially set in.

Check out this post by Leda Meredith to learn all you need to know about sunchokes and get a great pickled sunchoke and mushroom recipe. Pickle! Mushroom! Yeah, you know I had to share that one.

Creamy Sunchoke soup with Chevril Oil and Sunchoke Crisps - this one is worth it just for the sunchoke crisps! Seriously. You might need to make those all the time.

Carmalized Sunchokes with Beet Confit - Much simpler than the name may imply. Added bonus of using the oven which with make your place warm and toasty, smelling of sweet beets and sunchokes.

Sunchoke, Apple and Fennel Salad - this is for those that like something crisp, refreshing, sweet and winter-y!

Alright, so you went to the farmer's market and got sunchokes and ate them to your hearts content. You discovered something delicious with minimal prodding from me. Excellent. Now it's time to move on to the roots in the supermarket that you only see old Hispanic ladies buying.

Yuca AKA cassava AKA manioc AKA tapioca is a starchy tuber you should be more familiar with. Maybe you've had it deep fried like fries at your favorite Spanish restaurant, or maybe you've had some awesome bubble tea with tapioca balls in it. A versatile tuber that a lot of people reading this post have never made themselves. (Or maybe not! Tell me if you've cooked it before!)

There is so much to say about this widely eaten root, I think it would be more appropriate to give you recipes and some general direction.

How to prepare! Seems pretty self explanatory, but this slide show will help you out if you're having some troubles.


Puchero - This pork, beef, and chicken soup is the kind of hearty love child you want to have with your kitchen.

Fried Yuca! - Straight up delicious. Follow the recipe for the spicy mayo as well.

Cassava with Garlic and Citrus - This preparation is fantastic and easy. Citrus is in season right now, so go out an try a few different kinds. Excellent side dish for roast meats!

So pretty much, you've got nothing to lose - except those bourgeois potatoes you keep in some dark corner of your pantry or fridge.

Here are two easy recipes for roots and tubers you may see during your starch investigation.

Roasted Batata with lime-cumin butter - check this one out if you find batata!

Yautia - Boiled with ancho chilies.

Now granted, your neighborhood market may not look like the ones in these pictures. But chances are that they have quite a few starchy things you may normally pass over.

Reach out and try one. Most of them are super cheap anyway. Take one home. Boil it until tender and give it a taste. You'll have a better understanding of the flavor profile.

These pictures are from local Caribbean markets near my house. These particular markets on Flatbush avenue, especially near Church Ave.

You won't know you like them until you try them.
Worst comes to worst, everything tastes good with butter and garlic on top.

The Will Special

I work at a smoked fish and specialty shop called Shelsky's Smoked Fish in Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn.

I have a great time slicing salmon and sable by hand, making whitefish salad and mixing scallions into cream cheese. I help make bagels and suggest spreads for people that are in need of appetizing advice. I generally have a good time and things are swell.

It's an old-school style Jewish Appetizing store. There are not many left in the city, and Peter Shelsky (my boss!) is making a comeback and quite a splash (pun intended) in the city as a whole, let alone Brooklyn.

With the option of everything in the store for my breakfast/lunch it can be daunting to choose fatty Nova over earthy sturgeon, egg salad over whitefish. bagels or rye bread; the list goes on.

But about three out of every four days, I eat the Will Special.

Behold.

A toasted sesame bagel with butter, Gravlax, red onions and capers.  (just before a giant bite is taken out of it)

The bagel must be toasted so that most of the butter melts into the bread. It is acceptable to get this on a different bagel, although I do not suggest it (unless you like plain bagels). There should also be plenty of onion and plenty of capers. Double what you may normally get on a sandwich. These are not optional.

I love this sandwich. It is incredible.

We cure the gravlax in house and get the bagels from Mill Basin Bagel Cafe. These I feel, are important measures in this being a fantastic sandwich. The bagels are chewy and dense, with an excellent crunch from the crust. They are slightly sweeter than other bagels. No soft, pillowy bagels for me. I do not want a roll. If I wanted a roll, I would get a roll. I want a bagel.

The salmon is very smooth from the curing process. It tastes of dill and magic; not in an overwhelming way, but in an I'm-going-to-eat-an-entire-pound-of-this way. The cure (mostly salt and sugar) lends itself nicely to the salmon without making it too salty or too sweet. It has an almost raw mouth feel, and if we've learned anything from sushi, raw salmon can be sexy.

This all being said. Maybe Shelsky's is out of the question for you. Maybe you don't live in New York.

You can still have this sandwich.

Following the next picture there will be some links to curing your own gravlax. It is much easier than you can imagine, and you can play around with the flavors just as well. Or you can come to Shelsky's and buy some of ours which we make really well and is really amazing.

Isn't this what it's all about!?

Here are some basic Gravlax recipes that can be easily looked over and written down.

Gravlax How-To from Food52 This an excellent tutorial of curing your own fish. I would use about thirty times more dill than they show in the pictures (actually use an entire bunch or two). Also, if you don't have Aquavit, use a nice gin. At least you'll drink the gin afterwards! Try this gin called DH Krahn which is very citrus forward and slightly sweet.

Gravlax How-To from About.com This tutorial has some other ideas in it like using dill seeds and cutting the fillets down a little. It's okay to use just a little bit of salmon if you don't want to buy a whole fillet. Also, don't worry about all this freezing business; just buy fresh fish.

Step two of the Will Special? Buy a red onion and a small jar of capers in brine.
Put it all on a bagel, and send me some fan mail!

Winter Stews

It's no secret that stews are freaking awesome.

Stews can be incredibly complex or wonderfully simple: stretching ingredients or reducing them down; layering flavors or creating single notes.

In addition, stews are generally one-pot meals and crowd-pleasers.  Approachable to all walks of life, and a member of low-brow, high-brow and everything in-between, they make your house smell good, and can bring everyone back to Earth.

So, here is a collection of some recipes that I think are wonderful for the cold winter months. December is behind us, and with it, recollections of candy-canes and pine trees, latkes and menorahs. The wreaths and trees of most peoples' festive holiday are in the street, waiting for the chipper to turn them to mulch.

But we don't have to forget that it's still freaking cold, and we can sit around watching Netflix, drinking hot chocolate and making stew to warm our souls and fill our stomachs.

I'm going to skip more traditional stews and offer only the really cool, or mind-blowingly amazing ones.

First up, a stew that most people have never had: Mafe.
A stew of African origin, it can be as simple or complex as your cupboard. A strong base of tomatoes, chilies, meat and peanuts, it makes for a wonderful meal and a great introduction to more ethnic stews.

These three recipes are essentially the same. I will point out their differences so you can more easily choose the one you like. Or read them all and decide for yourself.


Mafe - food network: This recipe is a great introduction to Mafe. It is super easy, without a ton of ingredients. It will give you a feel for the stew and has plenty of room to improvise. For instance, if you don't have carrots, use another root vegetable or squash. Often times farmers markets will have a discount section or grab-bag of roots and such that you can get cheap and are perfect for this application.

Mafe - senegal: I like this recipe because it uses a lot of winter vegetables like squash and 'roots and tubers' and cabbage. However, it is lacking in the tomato department. If you don't have lamb, lean beef will work too. if you don't have beef you can use chicken etc. etc.

Peanut stew - nytimes: Now that you're familiar with Mafe, step it up a notch and make this version which includes whole chopped tomatoes and okra (I love okra). Perfect food for a cold winter night with rice or fat, thick egg noodles. (this page also has a bonus fish stew recipe)


So you've got the African stew down, or maybe you're allergic to peanuts. Either way, here is another stew with loads of flavor that is pretty wonderful with nice Italian bread, a nice Southern Cornbread (corn and mushrooms go really well together), or simply on its own with a bowl and spoon.

Pork and Mushroom Ragout - Food and Wine: This recipe brings out some really amazing earthy flavors. Mushrooms are one of my favorite ingredients for anything, and the meaty, umami-rich flavor they impart really pairs well with slow cooked stews.

Also, really simply stewed mushrooms are one of my favorite things to make. Pretty much just butter, mushrooms, fresh herbs and a little stock go a long way in terms of flavor.

Maybe your house doesn't see enough curry. Or maybe you don't make enough fish at home.
Here is a recipe with fantastic results and minimal heavy-fish odors. Anytime you mix curry and coconut milk, you're hard-pressed not to produce a winner.

Groan Curried Fish Stew: Make this stew. It's awesome. I know you don't make a lot of fish curry. I know it. Like they say, make a lot of rice to serve this with. Or, make lots of rice noodles or glass noodles and serve piping hot.

Here are some other fantastic stews to try when you're ready for some "adventurous" eating (ie. bored of the regular stuff and want to try these other cool stews)

Kimchi Stew: This bad-boy right here includes 3lbs of skinless pork belly. If spicy amazing kimchi isn't reason enough to try it, the pork belly should put you over the edge. If you really need a starch to eat this with, do I even need to mention what? Yeah, rice. Not a fan of rice? Try it with boiled Yucca (cassava) or big red potatoes; or just eat it as is, because it's awesome.

Red Chile and Pork Stew: This Carne Adobada is crazy good. Use Guajillo chilies if you can't find the New Mexico ones, or use a mix and follow the general recipe. It will be good. I promise. This stew doesn't need rice, but serve it with corn tortillas (not flour). It makes a difference, trust me.

Like something more involved? How about making Meatballs! Yeahhh meatballs!

T'fina Pkaila - Tunisian beef rib and meatball stew: This stew right here! Yes it is more involved. Yes it has more steps. Yes it is delicious. A little bit of spinach, some white beans, meat. It's got all the stew parts you want in your life. All of them. Cilantro. Beef ribs!

So there you have it folks. Various stews from around the world to keep you busy and full in the winter months.

When your house smells this delicious, you can be sure that your neighbors will "pop-in" to borrow something, only to fawn over the wonderful smells (and would you share!)